Part of our series “What is the best strategy to maximise the Return on Investment for your battery?”

In which we also answer the question “Should I Discharge during peak only, or peak and shoulder“ and “Is it worth discharging during off-peak periods in order to maximise solar soak-up?”

Now if you’ve taken the early adopter step of adding battery storage to your PV system, you might be wondering how to make the most of your battery in minimising your electricity bill. In other articles we’ve examined the best strategies for maximising Return on Investment in your battery. We’ve seen:

You can’t make enough money from a battery alone to justify its cost – you need to couple it with a PV system which does most of the heavy lifting in terms of ROI.

Smaller is better when it comes to ROI – as the battery acts to drag down the ROI of a PV system, so a smaller battery drags down the ROI less

One common idea put forward as a way of improving battery ROI is to double the amount of work the battery does each day, by pre-charging it from off-peak grid power to service your morning loads, before charging it again (this time from excess solar energy) so it can service your evening loads. By working it twice as hard, the theory is you will generate extra revenue (in the form of bill reduction) each year, so the battery should pay for itself sooner. But how does the theory stack up in reality? Let’s use PVsell to find out.

Is it worthwhile charging a battery from the grid at off-grid prices?

Part of our series “What is the best strategy to maximise the Return on Investment for your battery?”

In this article we demonstrate that batteries can’t pay for themselves without being coupled with solar power.

Have we discovered a perpetual profit machine hidden within the electricity network? Those greedy electricity retailers charge a fortune for power during peak periods (right when you’re using most energy), and much less during off-peak periods (when you’re asleep). What if you could charge a battery overnight from cheap off-peak electricity, and use the battery to supply your needs during expensive peak periods? Making money during your sleep, night after night, Genius! Right?

In case you hadn’t noticed, the return on investment of batteries isn’t flash. Thankfully there’s plenty of early adopters out there who will buy batteries regardless of ROI, because early adopters like the technology and the independence it offers. The way to sell batteries to them is to target sales message to the reasons they like batteries, which include:

Using their excess solar energy at night rather than exporting it to the grid for a pittance.

Avoiding ridiculously high peak electricity prices by charging their battery at low off-peak prices (or from the sun) and discharging their battery during peak price periods.

Reducing their dependence on the grid

Having protection against blackouts

Going completely off grid.

So if you’re going to successfully sell to early adopters, you need to be able to demonstrate that your battery will do each of these. Because early adopters like facts and figures you’re also going to need to quantify how much your battery will do each of these.

The following article was published recently on Solar Choice and gives insight into their experience with SunWiz's software, PVsell

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Let’s say that, like most Australians, you live in a grid-connected home. You’re thinking about installing batteries for your solar PV system, but aren’t clear about how much storage capacity you need. While you may have preferences and goals that go beyond simply saving money, you’ll still probably want to choose a battery system with a decent return on investment. We’ve taken a look at the numbers using PVSell and determined that a smaller battery bank is probably a better investment than a larger one (at least for now).

Making batteries make financial sense

Although solar PV systems are quite affordable on their own, battery storage is still on the pricey side. For virtually any battery product with a 10-year warranty, you’re looking to pay in the range of $2,000 per every kilowatt-hour (kWh) of storage capacity. These costs are likely to fall sharply in the near future (especially for lithium batteries), but are unlikely to move much during the remainder of 2016.

For example, the screenshot below identifies all Digital printers with a postcode starting '31xx', and I've selected the company Apple Print. Their Contact details are shown, and a click of the mouse will give me search results for the company in Google, LinkedIn, or their address in nearmap (if you have a nearmap subscription).